


Flight of the Ranger

by poisonedapple



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-10
Updated: 2016-06-10
Packaged: 2018-07-14 03:55:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,951
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7152017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/poisonedapple/pseuds/poisonedapple
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Vex gives Scanlan a lift on her broom as Vox Machina walks.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Flight of the Ranger

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place sometime during episodes 48 and 49, I think.

Scanlan had made the mistake of complaining about walking with Vox Machina, and all of their much longer strides compared to his much smaller ones, precisely once. It had been when they'd all first met and still had been getting to know each other, before Pike and Percy had even joined them. Scanlan wasn't quite sure what he'd been hoping for, as they had been quite short on time and no time to take a rest, but Vex had cooed at him and moments later Vax had picked him from under the armpit (like Scanlan was a child!) and set him on top of Trinket. Vax had smiled, seemingly innocent but upon getting to know Vax much better since then, Scanlan suspects differently.

It had been a humiliating and condescending ride on top of the lumbering beast and the start of his dislike of the bear.

Nowadays, when Vox Machina wasn't traveling by Keyleth's tree spell or on horses that they inevitably got killed, Scanlan kept his mouth shut and put all of his energy into keeping up. Pike, with her equally short legs and even heavier armor, never seemed to tire as they walked, but then Grog would often scoop her and give her a piggyback ride as they chatted amiably. Not that Scanlan would ever complain – he would allow a woman her tricks, of course.

And if Scanlan behaved well enough, Pike would occasionally lean in to whisper in Grog's ear and then Grog would give Scanlan a ride as well. Those times were particularly nice as he got to serenade Pike as much he liked then, even if he had to do it while they were clutching onto the back of a Goliath with an aversion to bathing.

Pike doesn't seem bothered by the walk today, though, keeping right up Grog as they walked deeper into the forest in search of Osysa's mate. She seemed eager to be back with Vox Machina after so long apart especially after being cooped up so long at Whitestone – they were all relieved to have her back and it showed from the parties collective animation to their accelerated momentum at which they were walking.

Well, the rest walked while Scanlan jogged and Vex flew, hovering at times to speak with the rest of them and other times she flew higher and circled above them, in a sort of lazy figure eight pattern, before swooping back down to rejoin them.

“Falling a bit behind there, Scanlan,” Vex told him, smile playing at the corner of her curved lips, as she did a nose-dive toward him on her broom before pulling out of the dive moments before crashing. The whites of her teeth gleam as she grins at him, pleased with herself – the show-off.

“Oh, don't worry about me – I've got the stamina to last for days,” Scanlan tells her between puffs of breath. “You know me. Lungs and fingers of a god,” he gives her a salacious wink,”Legs of a-,”

“Small gnome?” Vex finishes for him. He'd believe the look of absolute innocence she gives him if it'd been on Keyleth's face and he would likely allow Pike to get away with it (sweet though Pike might be, she's far from innocent but of course Scanlan loves her for it) – but he doesn't believe it for a moment from Vex.

“You know, I think I liked you better when you rode the bear,” Scanlan says, a bit peevish.

“Trinket?” Vex tips her head to the side just the slightest bit. “I've never ridden Trinket.”

“I'm sure I remember it.”

“Well, there was that time... in the Underdark, when Tiberius cast flight on Trinket so we could...” Her voice trails off for a moment. “But that was different! And look at me now! I'm flying, all by my self.”

“Actually, I think it's the broom doing the flying.”

Her lower lip juts out in a pout. “Scanlan, don't be mad with me.”

“Me? Mad at you?” Scanlan asks with a raised brow. “Now why would I be mad at you?”

“You are! You're mad at me, I can tell.” Her broom lowers further, so the toes of her feet are mere inches from the ground and her face nearly to his height. “Please don't be cross with me.”

Scanlan hadn't, in fact, been upset with her but Vex's insistence that he was was convincing him to be.

“Gods, you and that broom has been nothing but trouble for me lately,” Scanlan says wearily. “Stolen from a kind man who was only helping us and worse: me, lured into a bedroom under false pretenses! Not to mention that time you skewered me! At breakfast. At my own table, that I had kindly invited you to. Right through my larynx, too! I need that!”

“Yes, yes… I know. I really am sorry, that my arrow hit you the other day at breakfast. I didn't mean to, honest. I feel so bad.” To Vex's credit, she did look just as guilty as when her arrow had pierced his throat. “I was just going to ask, if you'd like to ride with me.”

“A ride with you, you say,” Scanlan says with an appraising eye. “On the broom you mean, right? Just to be sure – I don't want misunderstand what you're offering. It's happened before with you.”

“Yes, Scanlan. On the broom.”

“I dunno.” His eyes scan the broom, as he considered, feeling rather doubtful. “Would I be in front or back of you?”

Vex takes her time contemplating, before deciding, “In front of me.”

“Excellent!” Scanlan says, rubbing his hands together in delight. Vex's face flickers as she attempts to discern if she hadn't picked the worse of two evils. In honesty, Scanlan would have been satisfied either way, but it pleased him to see her face pinch up like she'd tasted a lemon as she regretted her choice. “You'll have to get a bit lower though, I can't get on like this.”

“Oh, I thought I'd just...” Her hands mimed lifting him and setting him down in front of her.

“Oh, no.” Scanlan shook his head. “I'll just walk, thanks. My, as you call them, small gnome legs were made for walking.”

“Fine, fine,” Vex says with a hard done by sigh and settles her feet on the ground and removes the broom from underneath her, looking extremely displeased to be back on solid ground. She jerks the broom to Scanlan to clamber on top of. The broom was rather large in Scanlan's hands and it was awkward as he situated himself.

“Ready to hope on behind me?” Scanlan asks, holding the broom between his legs.

Vex sighs loudly from her nose, before swinging her leg over the broom to join him, rather than side-saddle as she usually did. Scanlan scooches back and into her closer until she says, sharp and with warning,“Scanlan.”

The rest of Vox Machina continues plodding along ahead of them, though giving the pair cursory glances of perplexity, and together they stand with a broom between their legs.

“Okay, so when do we fly?” Scanlan asks when they remain grounded.

“Oh, right,” says Vex with realization. Scanlan can feel the warmth of her breath at the back of his head as she hisses the incantation to make the broom fly. It takes him a moment to interpret the feeling at the back of his neck with the sound she'd made, before he realizes.

“Did you just spit in my hair?” His hands search desperately at the back of head, trying to wipe it away. His hands don't find anything wet, but Scanlan is quite certain of what he heard. “That's disgusting!”

“What?” says Vex, sounding quite flummoxed - not Scanlan that trusts her at the moment. “No, no… Scanlan, that was just the incantation – you know, to make my broom fly. You were there when I figured it out – you helped me, remember?”

“It wasn't even just spitting – it's like you were gathering all the phlegm in the back of your throat and coughed out a loogie. Right in my hair – just above the neck you harpooned with your arrow!” Scanlan hasn't stopped trying to locate the loogie that he is certain is now in his hair. “You can't just do to people!”

“No, Scanlan – see? Huchtü!” Vex says in attempt to pacify him, voice low as Scanlan's distress began to garner the attention of the rest of their party ahead.

“Gah! You did it again!” Scanlan shrieks, both hands now rubbing desperately at his hair. “What's wrong with you?”

“I'm – I'm sorry, Scanlan! I'm not, I assure you I did not spit on you, or if I did then I didn't mean to… But I'm quite certain I didn't!” She's quiet for a moment, before she continues, “Besides, don't you shit in people's beds? And piss on vampires, effectively killing them? That's more disgusting, I'm sure-,”

“I don't shit on people's necks! And I only pee on the faces of _undead evil_ , not any of my friends!”

“I – you're right Scanlan,” Vex says with a sigh, after some consideration and coming to the conclusion that nothing but her assent with would assuage his conviction. “I'm sorry, please – just… Stop squirming a moment and then we can do some flying, yeah?” She wraps an arm tightly around his waist to steady them both to the broom, which distracts and mitigates his ire more than her words.

With just a touch of her hand along the handle, the broom ascends and they arc above the rest of their friends. It's quite extraordinary, really.

“Better than the carpet isn't it?” Vex says, eager and pleased and wanting very much for him to be pleased.

Scanlan's been on the flying carpet before, of course, and he'd flown while polymorphed as animals with wings but this is something quite different. With the carpet, the carpet had given some illusion of still having something solid beneath him. The broom though, well, Scanlan barely senses it underneath him. It was quite like flying – which it was.

“It is,” Scanlan agrees, for once not disagreeing just to give her a hard time. “You know… if you wanted… you could lend this to me.” At her dark look he amends, “Just once! So I could give Pike a ride, give her a show right?”

The amusement shows on Vex's face at the plan – Scanlan's gotten the impression that none of his friends really take his love for Pike seriously, including Pike herself at times. It was rather hurtful, really.

“I mean, you did shoot me through the neck. In front of a table of food I graciously provided. I mean, you don't have to, but it just seems like the kind of thing you could do for a guy you impaled with an arrow. On accident, of course.”

Vex sighs, though she seems rather satisfied that her transgression was being successfully being repaid. “Oh, all right. But only if I'm not using it! And you'll need to learn how to fly it. And if you damage it…,”

“Yes, yes,” Scanlan waves her off. “I'm sure I'd wish that the first arrow had killed me. But look – tell me, I think your brother is balding? 'Cause look.”

Vex's eyes narrow as they follow where his finger is pointing and then she laughs. “No, he isn't.”

“No, no. I'm quite sure your brother is going bald. I mean… look at it. A big old bald spot.”

Vex rolls her eyes but they spend the rest of their ride snickering over the heads of Vox Machina, elbowing each other to point things while giggling out just to make their party members paranoid.

**Author's Note:**

> In which I attempt to be humorous, but my humor tends to be dry so I probably failed.
> 
> Ah, well, episode 56 is about to come on.
> 
> Thank you for reading.


End file.
